The American Missionary

CONTENTS

• EDITORIAL.
  • NEW YEAR'S GREETING—FINANCIAL
  • PARAGRAPHS
  • PROHIBITION ITEMS
  • PARAGRAPHS
• THE SOUTH.
  • NOTES IN THE SADDLE
  • RELIGIOUS INTEREST IN LINCOLN CHURCH, WASHINGTON, D. C.
• THE INDIANS.
  • THE FOURTH BROTHER. By Mr. Frank Wood
• THE CHINESE.
  • DOES RESTRICTION RESTRICT?
• BUREAU OF WOMAN'S WORK.
  • FOUNDATION LAYING AND HOME BUILDING IN THE SOUTH. By Miss Josephine Kellogg
  • THE SANTEE NORMAL TRAINING SCHOOL AND INDIAN MISSIONS. By Mrs. Chas. W. Shelton
  • THE DAKOTA MISSIONARY SOCIETY
• RECEIPTS

American Missionary Association

COMMUNICATIONS

Relating to the work of the Association may be addressed to the Corresponding Secretaries; those relating to the collecting fields, to Rev. James Powell, D.D., or to the District Secretaries; letters for "THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY," to the Editor, at the New York Office.

DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS

In drafts, checks, registered letters or post-office orders, may be sent to H.W. Hubbard, Treasurer, 56 Reade Street, New York, or, when more convenient, to either of the Branch Offices, 21 Congregational House, Boston, Mass., or 151 Washington Street, Chicago, Ill. A payment of thirty dollars at one time constitutes a Life Member.

FORM OF A BEQUEST.

"I BEQUEATH to my executor (or executors) the sum of —— dollars, in trust, to pay the same in —— days after my decease to the person who, when the same is payable, shall act as Treasurer of the 'American Missionary Association,' of New York City, to be applied, under the direction of the Executive Committee of the Association, to its charitable uses and purposes," The Will should be attested by three witnesses.

THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY.

American Missionary Association.

A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! It is an inspiring delight to hear and speak the greeting. It is a phrase that comes down to us from the ages. All the more gladly do we repeat it on that account. There are some things, thank God, even in this world, that never grow old. The greetings of Christmas and New Year are among them. This is because they are connected with Christ and his kingdom. True happiness for mankind first came into this world when Christ was born. In proportion as he is received into human life, happiness is experienced. Therefore, in wishing for our readers a happy New Year, we are wishing for them more of Christ in their thought and life.

But Christ never comes into a life to be held there in confinement. He seeks our life that it may become a channel through which he may flow to bless and make happy other lives. He is not only our peace—he is our righteousness as well. How miserable we would be in our sins and shortcomings were this not so! But all the more on that account will we desire to do what we can to make up for our deficiencies. Loving him, we shall want to do his will. He wills that all shall hear of the salvation his gospel brings. We can proclaim the message. He wills that all shall see the power of his gospel in the benevolent fruits of his followers' lives. We can exhibit that power. Where we cannot go to tell the story and exhibit the power in person, we can send. Therefore, in wishing for our readers a happy New Year, we are wishing for them a righteousness that will manifest Christ actually saving the world in what they say and do. Happiness through service and sacrifice—this is the happiness THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY wishes for all its readers, because it is the only happiness worth having.

While January is the first month of the calendar year, it happens to be the fourth month of the A.M.A.'s fiscal year. It is a good time for our friends to make new resolutions in reference to what they will do in {2} support of our work the coming year. We closed last year out of debt. It was a cause for joy and thanksgiving. The Portland meeting felt and expressed it. Letters of congratulation came to us from all parts of the country. But there is something about prosperity that almost inevitably fosters decline. A woe seems to be attached to institutions as well as individuals of which all men speak well. We need $25,000 a month to pay necessary bills. We ought to have $30,000 a month to properly prosecute the work at this moment on hand. Our total receipts at the end of the first two months of the new fiscal year were $33,336. The lowest figure, in order to enable us to meet our bills for the two months, is $50,000. The result is, we are again obliged to report payments in excess of receipts. We do it unwillingly. We want very much to be delivered from the necessity of making special appeals along toward the end of the year. This necessity can be avoided only through our friends' securing increased receipts to our treasury the early part of the year. Now is the time to resolve that it shall be done. Let every church vote to give us a contribution. Let every individual friend resolve that he will, if possible, increase his contribution over that of last year, and that in any event he will by personal effort enlarge the circle of our supporters by inducing some friend or friends to take an interest in our work.

Memorial services in honor of our late President, Hon. Wm. B. Washburn, were held at Greenfield, Mass., Gov. Washburn's home, November 29th, under the auspices of the Connecticut Valley Congregational Club. Addresses were made by U.S. Senator Hoar, Rev. Dr. Buckingham, and President Seelye.

Thirty dollars constitute a Life Membership. Some of our friends utilize their contributions in this way. One of these writes us: "This is my thirty-first Life Member which it is my good fortune to make to your society." A good example to follow.

Lord Shaftsbury once said: "I think it would be of the greatest value if the reports of the various Religious and Charitable Societies were at once, by Act of Parliament, elevated into the dignity of Blue Books. If every Member of Parliament, under the most severe penalty—and more particularly the ministers of the day—were compelled to study them accurately, and then undergo a competitive examination, I am satisfied that great good would accrue to themselves and benefit to their country; their enlarged notions, and probably improved hearts, would be felt in the legislation of the country."

A pertinent illustration of the force of this statement is the speech of {3} Senator Frye, made at the Portland meeting. The Senator confessed that he had not been familiar with the history of the American Missionary Association, that he had been reading its Annual Reports, and making himself acquainted with its work. Thereupon, out of what he had learned, he constructed a speech that was, in every way, worthy of the Statesman that he is. We shall be much mistaken if Senator Frye does not find occasion to use the knowledge obtained in the study of our Association's history in some of his speeches or debates in the U.S. Senate.

The citizens of Macon, Ga., gave Jefferson Davis a rousing reception on the occasion of his recent visit to that city. As a souvenir of his welcome, they presented him with 126 bottles of wine, thirty-three bottles of whiskey, fourteen bottles of brandy, and eleven boxes of cigars. If these gifts suggest anything in regard to the habits of Jefferson Davis, we can readily see that he was not a fit candidate for having the ladies put upon his lapel a blue ribbon. No wonder he rushed into print to assure the public that he was not in favor of total abstinence. A campaign in behalf of prohibition would have a hard time in the region of Macon.

Evan P. Howell and Henry W. Grady are among the owners of the Atlanta Constitution. During the recent campaign on the liquor question in Atlanta these gentlemen were on opposite sides, so that the papers reported that while Mr. Grady was making a speech in behalf of prohibition in one part of the town, Capt. Howell was making a speech against it in another place. Two of Mr. Grady's speeches have been published in pamphlet form, and they are worthy of that gentleman's reputation as an orator. THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY is glad to find Mr. Grady on the right side of this question, and regrets that prohibition failed to carry the day in the election.

The colored people held the balance of power. We praised them last year when, using that balance, they carried the city for temperance. We regret that this year they have used it against temperance. There is no use of concealing the fact. Ignorant people cannot be depended upon to take the right side of any question. It will be a mere happening if they do. The election in Atlanta gives additional emphasis to the necessity of our work in the South.

White ladies so far overcame their caste prejudices as to join their colored sisters in the campaign for prohibition. Together they prayed and worked. Many of the white people were disgusted at this exhibition of social equality. These white ladies have taken a step in the right direction, and, when all their white sisters join them, reform will be well advanced. May the day be hastened!

The rum advocates resorted to all manner of devices to influence the colored people. They had a circular printed with a portrait of Abraham Lincoln. The picture represented him standing, with a slave in chains kneeling before him. Under the picture, in quotation marks, were the words, as if spoken by Mr. Lincoln: "Prohibition is slavery; I will cut the manacles from your hands." This was a mean trick. To put such lying words into the mouth of a man whose name the colored people revere next to that of the Saviour, is a piece of wickedness that only rum-sellers could be guilty of. It accomplished their vile purpose, however, in leading a great many colored people to vote against prohibition.

A colored preacher who made anti-prohibition speeches, referring to a statement that their meetings were not opened with prayer, said that he would make as good a prayer as anybody. Thereupon he slowly prayed: "Oh! Lord, I pray thee to help Atlanta in her extremity. Oh, do lift her up and restore her to the proud place she once occupied before these prohibition fanatics got her by the throat. Oh, Lord Jesus, do thou make these deluded preachers see the error of their ways. Do help the sweet inhabitants of this city. [Cries of 'Amen!'] Do restore to them pure liquor, and not compel them to drink the vile stuff sold as 'nerve tonic,' 'rice beer' and 'bitters.' [Applause and laughter.] Give us power to win the fight. [Cries of 'Amen.'] Put to rout the miserable hypocrites who parade as thy servants under the guise of Prohibitionists. Oh, do save us and let us win this fight, for Jesus' sake, amen. [Cheers, and cries of 'Amen.']" What can be expected of a church with such a man for its pastor, and what can be expected of a people if left to such leadership?

Rev. Geo. C. Rowe, of Charleston, S.C., in company with brethren Snelson, Maxwell, Jordan and Herron, going to attend the Association at Macon, Ga., by reason of a delayed train were in danger of missing connection at Jessup, a junction. The authorities telegraphed for the train to wait. When the little party reached Jessup, they found the train in waiting, and boarding it entered a first-class coach. We let Mr. Bowe tell the rest of the story:

"A burly white train-hand came in, and said, in a threatening way: 'The forward car is your car.' We gave him no answer, but kept our seats. The conductor came through and looked at us, but said nothing. At the door he asked, roughly, of a colored train hand, 'Why did you let those men go into that car?' They hardly knew how to act, as we were the only passengers who came on the S.F. & W. train, and they had been ordered to wait for passengers on that train; so, doubtless considering {5} discretion the better part of valor, they left us severely alone, and we rode from Savannah to Macon, an eight-hour journey in Georgia, first class, without molestation. Of course, the white people who entered at various stations stared at us, but we were good at that and returned the compliment. First class, indeed! Men with turpentine clothes, or rags, on; women chewing snuff, etc., etc. If I looked, acted and talked like some of the people that I saw on that train, I should certainly feel myself an appropriate subject for an ox-cart in the backwoods, rather than for a first class coach on a railroad; yet these are the people who object to respectable, well-dressed, intelligent and Christian men and women riding in a decent coach, on account of their color."

THE SOUTH.

NOTES IN THE SADDLE

BY FIELD-SUPERINTENDENT C.J. RYDER.

Pleasant Hill, Tenn., has now a school building worthy the growing importance of that interesting field on the Cumberland plateau. The teaching force has been enlarged and the influence of the school is constantly widening. Another building to be used for boarding pupils is in process of erection, and is greatly needed. Maine has joined hands with Tennessee in this most important work, several of the churches having given to this field.

A new church has just been organized at Crossville, Tenn. Many northern families have come into this region within the past few months, and they will greatly assist us in gathering the native mountain people.

Grand View Academy, occupying a most commanding site on the top of a mountain overlooking the magnificent valley of the Cumberland River, has also increased its school accommodations. There will be here, in the not very distant future, a large college, reaching in its influence the mountain people back on the plateau and in the coves, and those who are rapidly filling the fertile valley along the foot of Cumberland Mountain and Walden's Ridge. If we, as Congregational Churches, hold this grand work, we must generously support it now.

A specimen, a hybrid of civilization and paganism, I saw on the streets of Fort Smith, Arkansas. He seemed to illustrate the result of our governmental efforts to citizenize the Indian without Christianizing him. A tall Indian, of fine, commanding figure, walked down the street dressed in the following fashion: His feet were cased in moccasins, his legs in buckskin {6} breeches. Both of these garments were highly ornamented with quills and beads. He was purely Indian so far. His tall lithe body was closely buttoned in a faded black Prince Albert coat. On his head he wore a Derby hat. So much for civilization. The hat had a hole in the crown, and in this hole the Brave had stuck a large tuft of eagle feathers that stood several inches above his head and nodded and danced above him as he walked with the royal dignity of a Mogg Megone. Here was civilization and savagery in dress at least. This is about what our Government is doing for this people; urging them to put on the faded coat of imperfect citizenship, and at the same time forbidding that they be instructed in the truths of religion in their own language. We can never civilize the body while we leave the heart savage. A visit to Fort Smith would convince anyone of the absolute failure of this method. In the miserable prison pen, one hundred and forty-four were crowded like cattle. Among this multitude of criminals were young boys, just entering upon a life of crime, imprisoned for some paltry offence, and herded with them were grey-headed murderers. All these prisoners were from the Indian Territory, or the "Nation" as they call it. One man had just been convicted of murder. Two beautiful daughters of an Indian mother stood weeping beside him. A gallows stands constantly on the edge of the "Nation," and is used with appalling frequency. A lawyer who courteously introduced me into the esoteric mysteries of the law as executed in this United States Court, pointed out the peculiar construction of the gallows which increased its capacity. "Eight men can stand on that plank and the drop will swing them all off at once," he said with evident pride, then added apologetically, "I never saw but six hung at one time, but they do hang eight."

"Hanging day," I was informed, was one of the great festival occasions. Thousands of Indians, of more or less purity of blood, gathered from the "Nation" to enjoy this treat. There is an excuse for a fence around this perpetual gallows, but there are wide openings in it and the awful scene enacted within its enclosure can be witnessed from surrounding elevations.

No doubt an attempt at justice is made in the United States Court. I attended the trial of a case and it seemed to me the accused had a fair hearing, but what a comment on our Christian civilization: A court overrun with cases; a prison pen with young boys and grey-headed criminals herded together in it; a gallows standing ready the year round; saloons and brothels permitted at every turn; bad men and worse women appealing to the lowest passions of ignorant and degraded men—all these the legalized representatives of a Christian civilization. Is it strange that these Indians do not accept more readily our Christian theories, when they come into constant contact with our most unchristian practice? The Indian language is used in saloons and gambling hells and brothels to lead these poor, heathen people to physical and moral perdition, but is forbidden by Government to be used in mission schools to lead them to the Lord Jesus {7} Christ! We ought to plant a mission for the Indians and the colored people at Fort Smith this year. The work is painfully urgent.

RELIGIOUS INTEREST AT LINCOLN MEMORIAL CHURCH, WASHINGTON, D.C.

Rev. James Wharton, the English Evangelist, recently spent a little more than two weeks with the Lincoln Memorial Church, Washington. The people were deeply stirred, and the church was greatly quickened. About forty persons professed conversion, and a large number are still inquiring the way.

The conversions were mostly among the young people. There were eight or ten adults who decided to live Christian lives, two of them being aged men, one 61 years and the other 75 years of age. They are both very happy in their new-found hope in Christ.

Many of the young people would gladly unite with us, but their parents will not consent for them to do so, as they will not be convinced that the children can be Christians unless they can give a remarkable experience, and some will not be satisfied of their conversion unless the child has seen a vision or heard a voice.

I called to-day to see the mother of a little girl who confessed Christ as her Saviour in our meetings. She said that her little girls, one eight years and the other twelve years of age, say that they are Christians. When the mother told Josie, the youngest child, that she did not have "religion," the little girl replied: "I love the Saviour, and Jesus loves me. He died for my sins, and I have accepted him as my Saviour and am happy in His love. Mamma, Mr. Moore says that that is religion. If that ain't religion, then, mamma, what is religion? I want to be an earnest Christian; will you show me how?" The mother says that Josie sticks to it that she is a Christian, and that she does not know what to do about it.

The most of these young people, some of whom are twelve and fourteen years of age, will not be allowed to join any church, but will be laughed at and persecuted and led to expect some remarkable experience like "Saul of Tarsus," or to see a vision and hear a voice. We shall do what we can to encourage them to cling to Christ.

We have succeeded in closing two saloons near our church, and are hopeful of closing another notorious den about a square away.

There is no place where earnest Christian work is more needed than here at the nation's Capital, where we have a colored population of nearly 80,000, the majority of whom are out of Christ, and thousands are still shrouded in the darkness of ignorance and superstition.

GEO. W. MOORE.

THE INDIANS.

THE FOURTH BROTHER.

BY FRANK WOOD, ESQ.

I believe that if the Master were visibly present with us to-day, and we should ask, "Where shall we go first with the Gospel?" he would say, "Go to that fourth brother, the North American Indian;" and for the strongest reasons.

First, because he is in the greatest need. There are no people in want whose cry does not at once reach the heart of the American people. When Chicago was burned, when there was an earthquake in Charleston, when there was a famine in Ireland, public sympathy was immediately awakened, and all that was needed was sent. The only people who seem to be in need and do not receive help are the aborigines of our soil—the people whom we have dispossessed; whom we have crowded from their homes; whom we have shut into reservations until they are nothing but prisoners of war; whom we have placed under the control of a despot called an Indian agent, who is not controlled by law, who on that agency governs by his own will, with no courts to protect those who are wronged. These Indians are shut in on these reservations, kept from all civilizing and Christianizing influences, kept from trade and commerce. A trader is appointed over them, from whom they must buy everything they need, paying whatever he may ask, to whom they must sell everything that they would sell, taking what he may choose to give.

We have, it is true, a cumbrous system of machinery which is supposed to educate and civilize the Indian, called the Indian Bureau. Some men have studied it for years, and they fail yet to comprehend it. I believe it is incomprehensible. I believe it was never intended to be understood. Some men ask what it does. It does little, and largely shows how not to do; and any effort to Christianize and elevate the Indians, so long as the present system remains, will be a failure. Now, when our philanthropists are endeavoring to lift them up, when our legislators are taking favorable action, this Indian Bureau, through its Assistant Commissioner, issues an order which says that the English language must be the only language taught or spoken in the mission-schools. The only language the Indian knows is forbidden. Suppose we were to try to learn a foreign language in that way? Suppose a Frenchman should come to teach us French, and neither of us spoke a word of English—how rapid would our progress be?

Thirty barrels of whiskey and one thousand scalping knives were issued not many years ago as civilizing agencies by this department. An instance given us last night by our friend from across the water, shows that the English circumlocution office is a greyhound compared with our Indian office. I remember a similar story that Bright Eyes told in Boston some years ago.

She was then a teacher in an Indian school. She had little children in her school that came some seven, eight, or ten miles barefooted, and winter was coming on, and her heart sympathized with these poor children who came so far to be taught. They happened to have a good agent, and he said, "Send an order for shoes for these children;" and she sent an order, with a request that they send the shoes, as they were really needed, on account of the frost and snow. The order went to Washington, went through the regular routine, and the next spring, after winter had passed, a case of shoes came for these little Indian children. When it was opened, she found it full of brogans, that had been made for the Southern negro in the rice-fields; and every shoe in that case was so large that there was not an adult Indian on the reservation that could wear it. That is how the Indian Bureau provides for the little Indian children when there is a case of special necessity. (Laughter.)

I could mention numerous illustrations showing that it is impossible to do any work that is required immediately, through this Indian Bureau. If people are starving, you cannot get food for them until they die.

Now, what is the remedy? I believe that Christianity is the only remedy—the only solution of the Indian question. Where they have had good Christian agents—and they have had some—where they have missionaries, the Indian has made wonderful progress. I think we can point to a few civilized and Christianized communities among the Indians that can find no parallel among the whites of the country. There is less crime, less immorality, more faithfulness to the requirements of the Christian religion and better observance of the Sabbath, more sincerity and earnestness in the performance of every Christian duty, than we can find in the same number of whites anywhere. At Metlakatla, as told by Mr. Duncan, the Indians now form a community of twelve hundred people, who have their churches, their stores, their town-halls. They live in houses, like other people; they appear like civilized people; they carry on all the vocations of civilized life; and all this has been done by the work of one man. There is no liquor-drinking or liquor-selling there. A majority of this twelve hundred people are earnest, faithful, consistent Christians. They get no help from the Government. They have built up and support their churches. Where can you see anything among the whites that equals it?

Then there is another reason why we should go to them with the gospel of Christ. It is a good thing to engage in works of charity and benevolence, but before we do this we should pay our debts. We owe so much to the Indians of this country, that I think before we go anywhere else we should do something to atone for the years of wrong, for the centuries of injury, that they have suffered at our hands. We have taken their homes from them. We have driven them from reservation to reservation. We have taken their crops when almost ready to reap. We have removed them into climates where they have died by hundreds. We {10} have not listened to their cries. We have on various trumped-up charges frequently slaughtered these people, and treated them in the most cruel manner. There is no question that I know of that so holds a man, once interested, and so grows upon him, as this Indian question.

I was first interested in this subject about ten years ago in the city of Boston, where Bright Eyes, Mr. Tibbles, and old Standing Bear came to tell of the wrongs of the Poncas. They were to hold a public meeting. Wendell Phillips was to speak. I went to that meeting more with a desire to hear Phillips than from any interest in the Indian. At that time all I knew about him was what I had learned from the current literature and romance, and my idea was very far from correct. At that meeting a state of affairs was shown to exist that seemed astounding and impossible. A committee was appointed to investigate these statements. They found that the half had not been told. That committee started measures that rectified these wrongs done to the Poncas. It commenced suit under the Fourteenth Amendment to see whether the Indians were citizens. The Judges of the Supreme Court decided that the Indian was not a person under the law. Then it tried other channels; to get legislation that would help the Indian. Senator Dawes soon became interested in this question, and from that time to the present he has been interested; and how much the Indian owes to the legislation which has been started and carried forward by Senator Dawes, but very few people know; but it must be followed by other legislation before the Indian is safe.

In Boston, Mrs. H.H. Jackson listened to the statement of Bright Eyes in regard to the wrongs suffered by her people. She came to her and said, "It is not possible that these things can be true." Bright Eyes showed her the official documents; she convinced her that it was true. From that hour that woman's whole soul was in the work. She afterwards wrote "A Century of Dishonor," and "Ramona," which has preached for the Indians, and will continue to do so. She gave her life finally for the Indians, the sickness that caused her death being brought on while engaged in work for them. This work gets hold of a man, if he has any blood in his veins and sympathy in his heart, and makes him feel, if he would stand without condemnation before God in the last day, that he must do something to redeem his country from dishonor, and deliver this people from worse than slavery.

Suppose we do not do it. Suppose we allow the Government to care for them. The Dawes Bill gives them citizenship, but what does the Indian get? One hundred and sixty acres of land—and he as naked as a babe on that land. He has had no training in education and systematic work of any kind; he has no tools—and if he had he would not know how to use them. He is in the midst of white enemies, who want his land. He has turned his back upon all the traditions of his ancestors. He has turned his face toward the whites, and his friends of the past are now his enemies. {11} He is in the midst of his reservation. His homestead is his own, yet no American citizen has a right there. If you and I go to teach him, we can be ordered off by the agent; and if we do not go he can put us in prison.

If we do not give protection and Christianity to them, there is no hope for these Indians. Their fate will be the same as Indians on the reservation in the State of New York, who have been for one hundred years in the midst of our best civilization, but are still lazy and shiftless, their reservation being permeated through and through with unmentionable vices. They have no interest in the civilization of the present. They are living in the past, dreaming over the glory of their ancestors. They cannot be reached through civilization without religion. To an Indian there is nothing secular. Everything pertains to his religion. When he goes on a hunt, if he has no success, it is because the gods are opposed to him; and if he is successful, the gods were in it. When we go to an Indian and seek to change him, we must first change his gods. We must Christianize him if we would civilize him. There is where many of our experiments have been wrong.

Is it not laid upon us, who know something of this work, to do this? I believe if we will not do it, that in the last great day, as we stand with the Indian before the judgment bar of God, our position will be worse than that of the Indian. It seems to me that I can hear what the Judge would say to him at that time. The Indian comes before God, a pagan from a Christian land; he comes having improved none of the powers that God gave him. The Lord might say to him: "Did I not give you as good opportunities and as good capacities as the white man in whose midst you were? This Christian nation is the foremost for missions. It has sent to all the lands of the earth, and yet here you come a pagan, not knowing God, uncivilized, a barbarian." Might not this Indian say: "I was in prison. I was surrounded by a reservation around whose outside lines were the soldiers of the United States, and I would be shot if I went off this reservation. I had no business with which to support myself; I had no chance for trade or commerce; I had to buy of and sell to one man. What opportunity had I? When an occasional missionary came to me with the gospel of Christ, I looked upon this man as one of my enemies—a man from the nation that had robbed me of my opportunities; and, my Father, why should I listen to him, especially when he spoke in a strange language? Am I to blame that I come here empty? Am I to blame that I must go away?" I believe the Lord would turn to us and say, "Inasmuch as ye have not done it to one of the least of these my brethren, ye have not done it unto Me." And, speaking for myself alone, I would rather at that last day be in the place of that darkened Indian—-savage, barbarian, pagan, as he is—than in the place of the Christian that knew of his need and would not help him.

THE CHINESE.

DOES RESTRICTION RESTRICT?

As a son of Maine, I am one of those who believe that prohibition can prohibit, and will do so effectively, if you will give it a fair chance, but I doubt whether restriction restricts, and have expressed that doubt in these columns more than once already. But we have been favored with fresh lessons on this subject, in its application to Chinese immigration. Chinese women are held in our San Francisco market, at prices ranging from nothing up to about $2,000. The soul, being that of a woman, has no value at any time, but the body, till worn out, is held at a fair percentage of its weight in gold.

Such being the demand, a supply became assured. No artificial barriers could exclude them. There would soon come to be some "Open Sesame" which no bolts could resist. As a matter of fact these women have been landed in numbers so great, and with an effrontery so flagrant, that even the Chinese Consulate now takes the matter up and puts to shame the appointed executors of American law. As to persons of the male sex, they come by various routes: some with certificates sent out to Hong Kong by our own officials to be sold there and viseéd by themselves on this side the sea; some come with strange stories of previous residence—stories confirmed by their vivid recollection of deep snow on Clay Street, and of Chinese conductors on our street-cars: some come smuggled from British Columbia, across Puget Sound, and others cross the invisible line between Canadian soil and that of our own free land with none to say them nay. Meanwhile some of our recent officials who have grown rich with strange rapidity, or have spent money with lavish generosity, are under arrest, and sensational developments are the daily promise of "live newspapers" in San Francisco.

What shall be done? Some of these papers (however incredulous they may be about prohibition prohibiting) are disposed to try it upon Chinese immigration. Nothing else, they tell us, can deliver us from a perpetual invasion by these Asiatic hordes. But, so far as I have seen, no ringing or enthusiastic response has greeted this suggestion. So long as it lives only in newspaper paragraphs, and no serious danger appears of its being put into effect, few men will have courage, or zeal and forwardness enough to contend with it, but let it be taken up in earnest, and pressed to actual enactment, and it would soon go the fit and ignoble way that the boycott has travelled. There are multitudes who do not object to cursing the Chinaman, but who don't mean to lose the double eagles which Chinese labor, and that alone, enables them to put to credit on their bank account.

It seems to me, however, well worth questioning whether a law that after six years of trial has been found to be fruitful in little except perjuries {13} and briberies,—a law which cannot be shown to have benefited a single American laborer, but has had some effect to compel house-holders to pay larger wages to Chinese domestics, and to enable Chinese fruit-pickers to make better terms with our fruit-growers:—it seems to me a question whether a statute of that sort might not be suffered to expire through its own limitations, without any damage to the Commonwealth.

Whatever the fate of this law may be, it is sufficiently evident that our gospel work need not be stayed for lack of souls to work upon, till China herself and all her broad domain, becomes the Lord's.

YONG JIN AT SACRAMENTO.

I reserve a little space in order to give our readers a little sample of this gospel work as it appears in a letter from our helper, Yong Jin. He has recently returned from China where he did good service under Rev. Mr. Hazen, and he has resumed service with us. "I will tell you what I had to do with the brethren. Monday night after the school is out [i.e. 9:30] we have the Bible lesson of Chinese, and Tuesday night too. Wednesday night we have a prayer-meeting after school is out. Thursday night we have ten or fifteen minutes to speak the gospel before the school is out. Friday night we have a Bible lesson in Chinese too. Saturday night we have a prayer meeting again. Sunday night all the same. But last Sunday noon I preach on the street where the Chinese live. Perhaps I will preach in the street nest Sunday. By and by, if I do not preach on the street, I shall preach in the mission-house on Sunday noon. I shall do as best I can, and I hope God will help us to do."

I will add that we are hoping to commence special evangelistic work early in December. Loo Quong will go to our missions in Southern California, and Chin Toy to those north of us, beginning in Stockton, where the door seems to be opening wide, and an earnest spirit among the brethren gives promise of good results. I wish these brethren might be remembered by our Eastern brethren with special prayer.

WM. C. POND

BUREAU OF WOMAN'S WORK.

MISS D.E. EMERSON, SECRETARY.

WOMAN'S STATE ORGANIZATIONS.

CO-OPERATING WITH THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION.

ME.—-Woman's Aid to A.M.A., Chairman of Committee, Mrs. C.A. Woodbury, Woodfords, Me.

VT.—Woman's Aid to A.M.A., Chairman of Committee, Mrs. Henry Fairbanks, St. Johnsbury, Vt.

CONN.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. S.M. Hotchkiss, 171 Capitol Ave., Hartford, Conn.

MICH.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. Mary B. Warren, Lansing, Mich.

WIS.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C. Matter, Brodhead, Wis.

MINN.—Woman's Home Miss. Society, Secretary, Mrs. H.L. Chase, 2,760 Second Ave., South, Minneapolis, Minn.

N.Y.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C.C. Creegan, Syracuse, N. Y.

OHIO.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. Flora K. Regal, Oberlin, Ohio.

ILL.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. C.H. Taintor, 151 Washington St., Chicago, Ill.

IOWA.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Miss Ella B. Marsa, Grinnell, Iowa.

KANSAS.—Woman's Home Miss. Society, Secretary, Mrs. Addison Blanchard, Topeka, Kan.

SOUTH DAKOTA.—Woman's Home Miss. Union, Secretary, Mrs. W.E. Thrall, Amour, Dak.

FOUNDATION LAYING AND HOME BUILDING IN THE SOUTH.

BY MISS JOSEPHINE KELLOGG.

The estimation in which "woman's work for woman" is held by our more thoughtful colored students, will be shown by some extracts from an address by a graduate of Tougaloo University in Mississippi.

The effect of very unhappy experiences in early youth upon an exceedingly sensitive temperament, was to make this son of a white father and black mother cherish a feeling of intense hatred toward all white people as he was growing up; but being led, in the good providence of God, to a Christian training-school where he heard of One who suffered every indignity, and when dying in torture and ignominy prayed, "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do," new thoughts and feelings came to him.

He thought there might be cruel men in the world now who know not what they do. He was led to bow in penitence and submission at the feet of Jesus. It is now his chief joy that since he entered upon the path of learning, he has, as a teacher, given several thousand children a start in the same path.

The little old chapel at Tougaloo having burned down in January, 1882, he graduated in the spring of that year, from our elementary normal course, in the new barn, Ayrshire Hall. He has since passed through our higher normal and college preparatory course, and is pursuing further studies in another institution, in the intervals teaching, and going from place to place with the great desire in his heart of bringing about a better condition of feeling and living, among the people of the State.

I quote from his printed speech: "We read of a time when 'a nation shall be born in a day.' We have seen it come to pass, and this people is a babe yet. 'Is not the babe a blessing in the house? Its very helplessness is a blessing, in that it educates the finest sensibilities of humanity.' The problem to be solved now is how to nurse this babe aright. The thoughtful observer will be easily convinced that the careful and proper education of girls is the first step in the solution of this problem.

"The education of girls is of the most vital importance for the uplifting of the colored people of the South. Yes, I venture to say that the whole South will depend upon their condition for its prosperity. True progress depends upon the sacredness and sanctity of the home. That a people or a nation may be happy or prosperous it must have enlightened {15} and intelligent homes, and for this purpose the girls must be educated in virtue, industry and self-reliance.

"The colored woman in all conditions and under almost all circumstances is abused by all races and classes. There are individuals who love and respect her, but no one fears to insult her as they fear to insult other women. Let her turn wheresoever she may, she is met by all sorts of evil influences of a character too indecorous to think about, and I fear that I should never be forgiven if I should name them, yet we are compelled to look upon them everywhere we go. Now a reform must begin in the treatment of women, and it must be commenced by paying more attention to the education of girls. Only wise mothers can train champions for great causes like this. Therefore let our voices and our influence be given to the work of elevating the women who have the care of making and preserving society."

Thus it has come about that a larger and larger proportion of girls come to our schools, and it has seemed much better that they should be educated with their brothers than apart from them, for a great and grievous lack among the colored people, is a pure, safe and wholesome social life for the young people, and with all the other labors laid upon these "universe—ities" is that of fostering such a social life and, as far as may be, setting forth the pattern for it. Permit me to introduce you to one of these schools which is in many of its features doubtless like all the rest.

Tougaloo University is one of the six chartered institutions maintained by the American Missionary Association with some aid from the State in which it is located. It is but a few miles from the capital of the great but undeveloped agricultural State of Mississippi, a State in which the largest town had, at the last census, less than twelve thousand inhabitants. This is very far south, in "the great black belt," where the plantations are large, and upon the country roads you will constantly see ten or more colored faces to one white one. It contained at the last census, above two hundred thousand more colored people than at Emancipation, and above one hundred and seventy thousand more colored than white. Do you not see how rapidly Christian education and training must go forward to keep pace with such facts as these?

Stepping off the afternoon train down the Chicago and New Orleans railway at the little station of Tougaloo, we look up through a pleasant vista about three-quarters of a mile and see the Mansion, Ballard Hall, Ladies' Hall, and Strieby Hall, the latter a brick house three stories high above the basement, dedicated Thanksgiving Day of 1881 in the presence of the venerable secretary for whom it was named. The work on this building was done by colored mechanics, students of the school making the brick and the stone, a sort of concrete for the trimmings.

Strieby Hall has accommodations for nearly a hundred young men, besides a teacher's family or two. It is kept in scrupulous neatness by the {16} young men under their matron's eye. She teaches them to nurse one another in sickness; she also instructs them in the care of their clothing and requires them to mend when the weekly wash comes in. One young man became so proud of his skill in this line that he wanted to put his darned old socks—old darned socks would sound better, perhaps—into our industrial exhibit for the New Orleans Exposition, among the chains and wheels from the blacksmith and wagon shops, the brackets, step-ladders, etc., from the carpenter shop, the cups and coffee-pots from the tinshop, and the girls' plain sewing and fancy-work.

There are regular apprentices to all the trades named, and all the boys of certain grades have lessons, one hour daily, in the several shops, to get the use of tools and simple work; there is also a course of industrial drawing running through the school grades for boys and girls alike.

The school is upon a plantation of five hundred acres, worked by the young men under the direction of the farm superintendent, a graduate of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, who gives them "talks," as he terms his lectures, upon practical themes pertaining to general farming, fruit-growing, and the care of stock.

As we walk up from the station through, first a wood of water-oak, sweet-gum and hickory, then an open glade with scattering persimmon trees upon it, and lastly, a fine park of postoaks draped with Spanish moss, we approach the old southern "Mansion," which was the only building of any account upon the ground when the Association purchased it in 1869, and which is still the handsomest one. It has a little romance of its own, having been made spacious and beautiful for a bride who never came into it; but, notwithstanding this disappointment of its builder, it has in God's providence been greatly connected with home-building.

Here live the President's family and some of the other teachers. Here are business offices, a pleasant reading-room with an open fire upon its hearth, and a small library adjoining. In this house is a guest-chamber where all friends of the school are made welcome, and here are the music-rooms, one containing a piano and one a cabinet organ.

More and more highly is the department of musical training esteemed by those who understand the work. All receive training in vocal music as a part of their daily school work, and would there were more with means to take instrumental lessons!

The best of music is taught, from the primary grades upward; and it is an inspiring thing to hear almost everybody who is at work or play, not at books, singing and chanting the most beautiful compositions; the girls from attic chamber to basement laundry, may be chanting, "Thou who leddest Joseph like a flock," while the carpenter's apprentices—perchance upon a barn-roof—may be rolling forth the temperance Marseillaise, and our ears may distinguish from the neighboring "quarters" the little children of the day and Sabbath-school singing cheerily,

Nothing, perhaps, more commends the school to the notice of our white neighbors than its music, and greater numbers of them will come to a concert than to any other exercise.

In the Mansion are our rooms for the Normal Department, a study room and a laboratory. The primary, intermediate and grammar grades are taught in the new school-house, between the Mansion and Strieby Hall, the upper part of which is a neat and commodious chapel. The primary school is free of tuition as a practice-school for the Normal students, and brings in many little ones from the region round about.

We send forth many teachers for the public schools, and despite the shortness of the terms and the want of appliances, we see encouraging evidences of better work done there from year to year. Besides test-book teaching, these young home-missionaries labor in many lines for the moral, social and material improvement of their people, and deserve much help and cheer.

A Biblical department is preparing young men to preach the gospel, and as they have the industrial training too, they will be fitted for a very practical sort of evangelism.

A night-school supplies instruction for farm-laborers, laundry girls, etc.

All school-room work, except that of the Biblical class and a part of the Normal work, is women's work.

Let us step into the Ladies' Hall on the other side of the Mansion from Ballard Hall. This is a very hive of female industry. Here is the girls' dormitory, with a capacity of about seventy-five, and the boarding department. All the work of the household, with trifling exceptions, is done by the young women and girls of the school. Each one does an hour's work a day, having it changed every month, and many do more to help themselves along. The girls have the care of their rooms and generally take great pride in having perfect "reports" for tidiness. Everything is simple and cheap and common, but that does not prevent its being homelike.

Personal cleanliness is required of course. Some few have been accustomed to it at home. One large girl said, when told that she must bathe, that she had not washed all over since she could remember, and she still refrained until put "under discipline." Finally she yielded, but in the evening was heard crying aloud from a seat on the top stair. The matron asked, "What is the matter?" and she replied, "Oh! oh! I've wet my skin and it's made me sick." This is a very extreme case of attachment to dirt, but it is interesting and marvellous to witness the changes in appearance, expression and manners, during a prolonged stay in school.

Besides general housework, the girls are given special instruction in cooking, nursing and care of health, under their experienced matron. They sew for an hour a day in classes, under the supervision of another lady who also instructs a class in cutting by model and dress-making, and sees that all the girls attend properly to their mending.

A Girls' Industrial Cottage has been started on a small scale, in which the girls will have the entire charge of household expenses and management. The little girls from round about are formed into sewing-bands and make commendable progress. Their mothers meet with one of the teachers on Saturday afternoons.

Underneath all these departments of training, it is sought to lay the great foundation principles of character. The Bible is a constantly used text-book in literally every department. We seek to give a "Thus saith the Lord," for everything that we inculcate, from order, punctuality and cleanliness, up to honesty, personal and social virtue, temperance, industry and benevolence.

There was a time when some distrust was manifest among the colored people for what they called "book religion." They wished to hold fast to "ole time 'ligion," and that sentiment is not entirely gone. We had a very zealous little neighbor, more aged than she looked, so bright and spry was she, whose husband was said to be over a hundred. She was a seer of visions and dreamer of dreams. What we thought a bad feature of her trances was, that she would sometimes speak in meeting of having seen Tougaloo University marching in a procession down to torment with our devoted matron and president at the head, their open Bibles in their hands. That was years ago. Now, when she sees our matron in her visions, it is up among the angels; and I believe the conviction is spreading that book religion, taken into the head, sinking down into the heart, and working out through the hands in deeds of active piety, is an excellent thing.

Besides our regular religious services, including our large and delightful Sabbath-school, we have various reformative and benevolent societies. Our temperance society carries the triple pledge at the front and saves many from the debasement of profanity, tobacco and ardent spirits in all their forms.

Our societies for social purity are designed to help in the cure of a terrible and terribly prevalent vice. The young men are taught, that while it would often be simply throwing life, with all its opportunities, away, for them to interpose by word or weapon in defense of weak and tempted womanhood, after all, man best defends woman by himself wearing the "White Cross" of manly virtue.

The girls are taught that woman's best defense is the "White Shield" of her own determined virtue and genuine modesty. The Y.M.C.A. and the Y.W.C.A. have interesting meetings conducted by themselves, with many committees for Christian work. A committee of girls goes out on {19} Saturday to visit sick and aged ones, both giving and receiving good. Another looks after new scholars who are often confused by their strange surroundings, and homesick for a time.

Our Missionary Society studies both home and foreign fields, and gives freely of its little fund. Recently a flame of missionary zeal was kindled by letters from missionaries in Africa with whom a number of our students were personally somewhat acquainted, and a large portion of our Sunday-school collections was voted directly to them.

All our students sympathize with the Indians, and there are two societies of the younger scholars who help them. The outside sewing-bands too, devoted their very first quilt to the Rosebud Indian Mission. "The field is the world" and "the work is one, one!"

Now, I ask you, friends, should not such work as this be amply sustained? So much more could be accomplished if the funds and sympathy were not so stinted! "The destruction of the poor is their poverty." We do not believe in giving money outright to pauperize these young people, but the money must be there or they can not be taken into the household, and trained and fitted to do valiant service for Christ, and the nation and the world. There are manifold ways of helping, but I shall not mention one, for if any are moved to help—as many are and have been—it will be so easy to find out a way.

Mrs. Dinah Mulock Craik was prompted to write her last book—in behalf of North of Ireland sufferers—by hearing a rough carter in a London street, who had got down from his cart to help a timid child over a crowded crossing, and had been rallied upon his soft-heartedness, say, "O, aye! but a 'andful o' 'elp is wuth a cartload o' pity."

As I have visited institutions rich in buildings, books, scholarships, professorships and every appliance, I have been very far from wishing their abundance less, but I have said in my heart, ought not this and similar missionary schools to be endowed also for their work of broad beneficence, reaching not only the far South of our own land, but to the heart of the great dark continent with its two hundred millions of perishing souls?

THE SANTEE NORMAL TRAINING SCHOOL AND INDIAN MISSIONS.

BY MRS. CHAS. W. SHELTON.

Running Antelope, an Indian chief, describing the condition of the Indians, said: "There was once a beautiful, clear lake of water, full of fish. The fish were happy and content, had plenty to eat, and nothing to trouble them. One day a man came and threw in a lump of mud, which frightened the fishes much and disturbed the water. Another day a man came again, and threw in some more mud, and even again and again, until {20} the water became so thick that the fish could not see at all; they were so blinded and so frightened that they ran against one another, and they ran their noses out of the water into the mud, where many of them died. In fact, they are in a bad condition, indeed. Now, the pond is the Indian country, the fishes are the Indians, the false treaties and promises of the white men are the lumps of mud," and, turning to the missionaries, he said: "I hope you have come to clear up the water." A glance at the work of the A.M.A. among the Indians will show that the missionaries are clearing up the water.

We all have heard of the Santee Normal Training School for Indians, in Nebraska. There is much in the name itself, and yet it is impossible to have a clear idea of the work done there unless one has seen for himself.

The Santee School is the largest of all the Indian mission schools under the A.M.A., and faithfully has she performed the part of a leader. The number of Indians gathered and instructed each year is in the neighborhood of 175. Many tribes are represented, and the students come from all directions. They are thoroughly trained from the very foundation, not only in the ordinary branches of school work, but also in housekeeping—sewing, cooking, washing, etc.,—on the part of the girls (in which, too, the boys join largely), and in farming, carpentry, blacksmithing and shoemaking, on the part of the boys.

Not only is this solid practical knowledge given them, but care and time is devoted toward grace and politeness, and all the foundation rules of etiquette. And this is not a thankless work. Anyone forming an idea of Indians from those at Santee would tell you they are naturally a most polite people—a people upon whom grace sits easily. There is many a little story of Santee I would like to tell, that would show the spirit which pervades the school. Something you may have read of their impromptu prayer-meetings, and the desire of many to work and study, not merely for themselves, but for their people.

But great as is the credit due the Indians for their advancement here, little could be seen of gain were it not that the corps of teachers sent out by the A.M.A. have been chosen, not from the lame, the halt and the blind of this country, not from those who for support must resort to something, but from those young women who are willing to leave homes of comfort and refinement, in order that their lives may be worth something in the world—young women who are consecrated beyond what we can even imagine until we have seen the difficulties and annoyances which form so large a part of their lives. Not for support would these women have gone into A.M.A. work, but cheerfully and gladly do they live on the very smallest possible salaries, that more may be done for the Indian.

In describing Santee I have described all the schools, for the same {21} plan is carried out everywhere—the plan of Christianization; for that must needs come before civilization can be hoped for.

The Indian is not civilized who, forsaking his heathen gods, has learned the ways of the white man without knowing his God; for invariably he learns the vices and the crimes; and is in reality more of a heathen than before.

Many are the villages of Indians in which the white man's dance has been introduced and is enjoyed much more than the native dance; it is working much evil which is hard to uproot, for they say, "Is it not the white man's way?—it must needs be all right."

The work among the older people is of course more limited than that done in the schools. The age of study is with them past. The most intellectual work of which they are capable is learning to read the Bible; even this they cannot do in any other than the Dakota language. It is impossible to teach an old man English that will ever mean much to him. Our word "holy" could never mean what his own word "wakan" means; our word "God" could never take the place of his "Wakantanka." His brain would be so disturbed in his effort to learn and to comprehend our difficult language, that when he had mastered the words, were it possible, the sweet truth and the comfort would be all gone from him. Any but a scholar must read the Bible in his own language.

Thousands of Indians are learning Bible truths and are getting a little light in the few years left them. They are learning a little of the way of life, and receive the message with gladness. Spotted Bear, a Christian Indian, said at the recent convention at Santee: "All we know we have learned out of the Dakota Bible. Teach our children English, but don't take from them and us the means of reading our own Bible."

James Garvey, another Indian, said: "Many can soon learn to read the Dakota Bible; then they have a standard of morals and of interpretation; for to get the real meaning of the English Bible, we go to the Dakota. To make the best citizens you must Christianize the people, and to make them Christians you must give them the Bible in their own tongue. All of us have become white people through the gospel."

The little native churches of Dakota are most interesting illustrations of the work going on among the Indians. It would be impossible to find more attentive audiences. There is always an air of devotion, or of serious attention to all that pertains to the service, which we are not apt to find in our own churches. Men, women and children go; even the babies are always taken. There is a quiet freedom there which allows the Indian mothers to take the babies out and in again at any time, and the preacher is never disturbed. They sing as if they enjoyed singing—men and women together; and in fact the services are usually such as to give one a new zeal in holy things, even though we can understand few words.

Each Indian church has its missionary society, and its woman's society, {22} which is also missionary. These have been working and giving for mission work further out among the Indians, and this year have pledged themselves to give to foreign missions. During the last year they have raised $1,084, of which the women raised $500. The prayer-meeting is as much an institution with them as with us—in fact, they live as we live and work as we work.

Ehnamani, pastor of the Santee church—a fine old man, whose history in connection with the Minnesota massacre of '62, and whose conversion and present work are well known—was once asked, "Do you ever have the least regret that the old life is gone—do you ever have any longing for the war and for the dance?" His face grew stern and hard as he answered, "Regret it! No, indeed! I cannot think of one good thing that I ever did in that life, and I cannot bear to remember it." Few are there yet like Ehnamani, though many are fast overtaking him, and a grand number of Christian workers would you see could they be gathered before you!

Many are the Indian hearts given back to God their Creator. Many are the Indian homes consecrated to the Wakantanka. Many are the Indian lives devoted to His service. And yet there are facts—there are overwhelming facts, sad enough to break the great, throbbing Christian heart of this country—facts that should make us cover our heads with shame.

Out of 40,000 Sioux Indians, there are 35,000 still in heathenism. There are sixty-six tribes on the Western prairies for whom nothing is yet done. There are 40,000 Indians of school age; but when every school is packed to its utmost only 12,000 can be accommodated. This includes Government schools, Roman Catholic schools, and all; so that those under mission teachers would be far less a number than 12,000.

And this is where the Indian work stands to-day. How can the A.M.A. do its share in this great work, or how can the work already begun be carried on, unless money is turned liberally into its treasury?

Shall the cry for help, coming 1,500 miles across the country, strike against a hard wall of indifference and be thrown back to mock the red man and to bid him wait yet longer?

THE DAKOTA MISSIONARY SOCIETY.

Its annual meeting was held in connection with the Dakota Conference, at the Santee Agency and in the dining-room of the Normal and Training School. There were two hundred Indian sisters present, besides the white lady teachers. They represented six mission stations and twice as many churches, each church having a wide awake woman's missionary society. After a hymn, the President, Mrs. Tasinasawin, led in prayer and read the first three verses of the 21st chapter of Luke, following it with a {23} few words about that widow's mite, saying that it was not the amount given, but the spirit in which it was given. That was the important thing. The Indian women are able to give but little, but if they give willingly, as to the Lord, He will bless it. The minutes were then read, and a new president and secretary elected. Two candidates were put in nomination for each office. As the roll was called each woman arose and voted viva voce. Mrs. Brascaw was elected president, and Miss Mary C. Collins, secretary. I was delighted to see the cheery way in which these sisters-in-red did their voting. There were several sallies of laughter.

Then the delegates made each a report of the work done in their societies and how much money had been raised. One woman from the Brown Earth Colony said: "We are poor, but we are interested in the work and have done what we could. Mr. Williamson taught me to read, and when I was young he taught many others to read. Now I am nearly blind but still I have done what I could."

Another said: When the pastor's wife was well she had helped them very much and had taught them many things, but now she was sick and could not attend many of their meetings, but they worked on and did the best they could.

Another said: "The gospel was sent to us when we were in darkness, and now though we are few and scattered far apart, yet we are anxious to send the same gospel to those who have not yet heard of it, and to help those around us to love our Saviour and to love each other, and we give gladly of the little that we have. It is not in our own strength that we do this, but it is in God who helps us."

It was found that the women had raised this year over five hundred dollars. This goes into the treasury of the Dakota Society to help to sustain four native preachers, who are also teachers, out among the wild Indians. One of the services of the Sabbath, the great day of the feast, was to hear from those their own missionaries to the heathen. At that meeting I counted five hundred and thirty Christian Indians, who also partook of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. To help their treasury the women had a Fair for the sale of articles of handiwork. The most noted one was a quilt which had been made and sent in by Caroline To-tee-doo-ta-win (Scarlet House), of Brown Earth, now in her 97th year. She was one of the first three converts who were organized into a church in 1834, at Lac-qui-parle, Minn. Her husband had two wives, and she was the second. Finding upon conversion that polygamy was contrary to the ordinance of God she at once proposed to be put away. She had been a member of the Order of the Sacred Dance, but this she renounced, throwing away her "medicine sack," which by the medicine men was regarded as a high crime. This subjected her to divers persecutions, which she bore patiently. There were times when all were forbidden to attend worship at the mission. Then she took joyfully to the spoiling of her goods, {24} the cutting up of her blanket, she received the Sabbath as God's day, and more than once remained behind her company when they travelled on that day, making it up on Monday. She learned from missionaries to spin and knit, and weave garments for herself and husband. At forty-five years of age she learned to read her Dakota Bible, and of her children she sent one to Ohio to learn the ways of Christian white people. She has adhered to the faith for these fifty-four years. With her quilt she sent the message that it was the last one she could make. It was bought by Miss N. Hunter, a teacher at the Yankton Agency, for four dollars, to be presented to Rev. Dr. Arthur Mitchell of the Presbyterian Board. It was this Miss Hunter who interpreted for me the addresses of the woman's meeting. Surely the Apostle Paul would say of these, "Help those women who labored with me in the Gospel." He who was so fond of naming the Christians who were "the first fruits of Achaia," would be very loving to this aged disciple, the first fruits of Dakota.

JOSEPH E. ROY.

A missionary from the South writes: "In speaking on prohibition I call attention to the fact that wherever there is a missionary school a majority of the colored people are Prohibitionists, and in alluding to places where local option has failed to banish the saloons because, as is alleged, 'the negroes voted the wet ticket,' I add, 'To the white citizens who make this complaint I would say, Oh, that ye had been wise! Oh, that during all the years that have elapsed since the war, instead of keeping out you had provided Christian teachers for these armed but untrained citizens, these dwellers within the gates, with whose fate your own is bound! Now would you have had able allies in this conflict with the powers of darkness, this struggle between the home and the saloon.'"

RECEIPTS FOR NOVEMBER, 1887.

H.W. HUBBARD, Treasurer, 56 Reade St, N.Y.